They said there was growing evidence to suggest the genetic inheritance could also impact on male fertility, and cognitive ability - and explain why men typically have a much shorter lifespan than women.

The average man can now expect to live to 79 and a half, while the average woman has a life expectancy of 83.3 years.

Speaking at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology's annual meeting in Lisbon, genetist Prof Neil Gemmell, from the University of Otago, said: "I called it mother's curse - it's I guess an unfortunate accident of the maternal inheritance that means the male offspring are cursed, or bestowed with suboptimal mitochondrial types," because such DNA caused no problems in women.

"In a way, this is why you can blame your mother for absolutely everything," he said. "I think of males as being an evolutionary cul-de-sac in terms of mitochondrial DNA."